Matched
by Leca B
Summary: Ginny stumbles through their fireplace with gleaming eyes and a look that both amuses and terrifies him. "Welcome back," Harry starts, but stops at the shit-eating grin currently on Ginny's face. "What is it this time? Theft? Murder?" "Match-making!" she exclaims.


Ginny was lucky to live long enough to see herself start to turn into her mother. She won't admit to it, no woman would, and Harry has too much respect for his well being to ever in a million years mention it, but sometimes it's uncanny.

On one such time, she stumbles through their fireplace with gleaming eyes and a _look_ that both amuses and terrifies him. Harry's sitting by the kitchen table, dividing his attention between the 6pm news and feeding James when his wife drops the groceries on the table with a bang. He should not have been that startled, what with the whole being an Auror thing, but he was so concentrated with catching the mushy veggies James keeps trying to spit out that he might have jumped a little bit in his chair. He misses James' mouth and nearly shoves the puree up his son's nose. James is alarmed for a second, but thankfully not too bothered, just babbles a bit louder and tries to take the spoon from his father's hand.

"Welcome back," Harry starts, but stops at the shit-eating grin currently on Ginny's face. "What is it this time? Theft? Murder?"

"Match-making!" she exclaims.

He groans. "Are you sure? I can do theft. I robbed Gringotts once. Wouldn't you rather do that?"

She pats his cheek in a slightly condescending manner and moves on to press a kiss to the only mush-free part of her son, which is the top of his head. "You took the fun from it when you absconded with their dragon."

"I'm sure they've gotten a new dragon."

She sends him a glare that's only half amusement, and he gives up.

"Alright. Who is it then?"

"It's Percy!"

"Percy?" Harry tries not to sound too incredulous, because Percy had spent the last few years doing his best to make up for being a prat, but still. He was still pompous at best and dreadfully dull at worst. Most days he bored Harry to tears. He bored _Ginny_ to tears, and she was his sister.

"I know, I know what you're thinking. How can I subject a poor unsuspecting woman to Percy's… Well. Percy-ness. But hear me out, I think I found his soulmate." She plops down on the chair across from him and excitedly starts to share her story. "So I was at the ministry earlier right? Sorting out the whole Wales portkey business, and I thought I could go and ask Hermione if she wanted to grab a bite to eat, and of course I had no visitor pass, because, right? I'm Ginny bloody Potter, mate. I'm made of awesome. "

He starts smiling before she can finish because for one, there's still something in his chest that turns to mush when she says 'Ginny Potter' but also because her enthusiasm is kind of adorable, and maybe a little bit contagious. He still teases her, though.

"Oh, you don't need a visitor pass when you're made of awesome?"

"'course not, Harry, it's the law, do keep up. Anyway, I'm just walking into DMLE when this tiny, tiny woman comes out of literally nowhere and asks for my visitor pass." Harry chooses not to mention Ginny herself is rather short, because he'd rather live. "So I tell her I was just waiting for my sister-in-law and you know what she did?"

"What?"

"She demanded I go out and come back with a pass because it's _protocol,_ " and she says it like protocol is the dirtiest word in the lexicon.

To be completely honest, Harry doesn't think that's too out of this world. In fact he'd sort of been present during the meeting that approved such protocol, after one too many visitors wandered into DMLE solely to sneak a peek at their weirdly large amount of war heroes. He isn't going to tell her that, though. He obligingly snorts in derision.

"Wow," he says, as deadpan as he can.

"Yeah, right? And then Hermione comes out of her office and spots her and- you should have seen her face, she was so put off! And she kind of waves this girl off and tells me I can come into the office and can you guess what she did next?"

"Not really, no."

"She asked me if I had set an _appointment."_

Harry can't help but laugh then. Because that sounds rather more unnecessary than asking for a visitor pass. "Wow," he repeats, and this time it carries a more real disbelief.

"She wouldn't let me in, Harry. Hermione was _right there_ and she wouldn't let me in without an appointment, it was so bloody stupid. Just think about it, how uptight do you have to be to piss off _Hermione_ by sticking to the rules?"

"That's honestly terrifying."

"Exactly! So what Hermione does is walk into her office, grab her purse and just leaves, because that woman just wouldn't let me in, and turns out the girl's her secretary but Mione can't stand her because she just follows protocol to a T, even when the rules don't make sense and they're there for formality and she's very pompous too, and I'm sitting there thinking 'who else do we know that's a boring prat?'" she looks at him with eyebrows raised and a grin, and then seems to realize that's a rather mean thing to say about a brother, even if it's true, and adds, "Bless his heart."

"That's it? She's pompous and boring?" he asks, looking at her like he's half expecting it to be a joke.

Ginny shrugs. "Apparently she's really big on bird watching too." He raises his eyebrows higher, as if to say ' _this_ is the joke right?' to which she shakes her head. "I'm not even making this up, I honestly wish I were."

"Okay. Boring. Formal. Birdwatcher. Sounds charming. But love, are you sure that's the person you want to sick at your brother? I mean, if they do get on, we're going to have to see her a whole lot more than just at Hermione's office."

Ginny stops at that. She hadn't considered that part. "Bugger, you're right."

"I love your family to bits, Gin, but I can only deal with one Percy a Christmas, and I know you do too. Imagine sitting at your mum's kitchen listening to bird watching stories?"

Ginny sniffs, throws her hair over her shoulder and tries to look dignified. "I'm sure they're fascinating."

Harry opens his mouth to reply, but is brought back to James when he starts waving his chubby arms and whining at the lack of attention and food, and manages to slap the spoon off of Harry's hand. It goes clattering away until it stops very near the counters.

"Oh, baby," Ginny laughs, momentarily distracted by the right state her son is currently in. James is a messy eater, tends to spit right back half the food that goes in his mouth, and it shows. "That's a rather fetching shade of carrot you've got on, mate," she tells him, grinning.

Harry just sighs and gets up to pick up the cute, bear shaped spoon off the ground and give it a quick wash.

"Gin… Maybe you should have a little more faith in your brother. Let him work things out for himself."

"But he's hopeless!" she whines.

"You said that about Ron too. And George. They're both happily married now, and they didn't need your help."

He turns his back to her as he's washing the spoon and wiping some of the carrot puree that had inevitably ended up on his shirt, but he can practically see the pout. Or maybe he's wrong, because a minute later he feels her arms wrap around his middle and she stands a bit on her tiptoes to rest her chin on his shoulder.

"I know I'm sticking my nose into his business, he'd probably be mortified too, it's just… Bill has Fleur, and George has Angelina now, and Ron has Hermione… And I have you." She makes her point by pressing a kiss between his shoulder blades. "And I know Charlie does not give a rat's ass about finding someone, he's all up in his dragons. Probably shagging everyone in camp too, blimey. But Percy's always just sort of… there. He's always so alone, and I think he's just… Lonely," she finishes in a whisper.

Harry's heart aches a little bit at her tone, because she just sounds so much sadder all of a sudden. He turns around to wrap his own arms around her and pull her into his chest. She cuddles against him, all the exuberance from early mellowed out. Because at the end of the day, that in which Ginny Weasley resembles her mother the most is her heart, and she doesn't want anyone in her family to feel alone.

"It's not that I _want_ to meddle, Harry…"

"You sort of do, love. A little bit," he teases, and she relents.

"Well, maybe I like the glory and being able to lord it over them that they owe me for life. But I do mean it, Harry. Percy's a bit of a prat, but he's not a bad bloke, and he's my brother. I just want him to be happy."

And she's giving him the big brown eyes that he just can't resist, the same brown eyes James inherited, and Harry loves these two more than he's ever loved anyone in his life, and he knows he's going to do anything she asks. Even if that something is sitting through a ridiculous double date with his least favorite brother-in-law and a woman that sounds like a nightmare. He's going to go along with whatever scheme his match-making wife makes up.

"So? Will you help?" she asks, puppy eyes on full power.

He sighs, exasperated. "I'm going to regret this."

The puppy eyes disappear immediately and she surges forward to smack a kiss against his mouth that is a little bit painful. He tries not to feel like she's just manipulated the hell out of him. He fails.

"I love you!"

He rolls his eyes, but there's that warmth spreading in his chest that never fails to follow those words. "I love you too, but I feel like I might love you a little less after this."

"Don't be a baby. You'll be fine. In fact you'll love me even more because I am going to be even more amazing after this success."

"What are you going to do?"

"I haven't actually thought that far ahead but I'm definitely going to need a visitor pass."


End file.
